White Rose...

Wednesday, 16th November 2011

Playing with the new camera again...  this series of photos were taken of the white rose which still has a few blossoms even so late in the Autumn...

I liked the brown stamens and the sandy coloured dying petals...  The photos are not quite as sharp as I would like but we have a slight breeze outside today...  and a breeze always affects close-ups...  I like the lovely soft bokeh in the background of the rose...  the colours blend into each other in a way that doesn't detract from the subject of the photograph...

This is a particularly pretty white rose that grows in my shadiest flower bed near the neighbours garage wall...

A test close-up shot taken with the lens 1 cm from the rose...  I like the sharp focal point and how the rest of the petals become beautifully blurry...

The Panasonic Lumix DMC-LX5 is a nice camera to hold... a solid feeling and weight in my hands...

Jeepers Creepers...

Monday 4th July 2011

Macro Monday

I particularly love the Virginia Creeper in Spring and Summer with its beautiful green leaves and blush coloured shoots...

It is an elegant plant as it drapes over the fence and across the doorway.

"Please may I come in?" 

"No" we all say in unison looking at the state of her wet muddy paws and fur after her latest excursion into the pond.

This was my favourite photo.  I loved the way the sunlight lit up the leaves and made them glow.

"Jeepers creepers, won't you let me come in?"  she says, still hopeful, "anyway, I am much cuter than those silly virginia creeper leaves that you are photographing".   "Pleeeeeease....."

Old Table...

Monday 13th June 2011

Macro Monday

The old wooden table in the garden in Kent...

Lovely worn weathered wood...

I liked the two stones that were sitting on the table top...

I have always loved the warmth of these beautiful materials...

I liked the shadows cast by the evening sun...

The wood is covered by moss and lichen...

The weathered wood has warped and split over the years...

I love the warm mellow colours of the Kentish rock...

I love these types of natural still life...

Kingcups...

9 May 2011

 Macro Monday...  We have had a few very dry weeks of sunny weather... so this year it has been possible to walk in the early evening through the Kingcups... 

Usually this area of ground is very wet and marshy but this year it has dried to a soggy mud...

I don't know of any other  area on Cavehill where the Kingcups grow except here and I like to come to look at them at the end of April when they are in full bloom...

The Kingcup is a perennial herb with a short underground rhizome which gives rise to erect hollow stems up to 18" (45cm) high...

These beautiful blossoms are also known as Marsh Marigolds, Mary-buds (Shakespeare), Marygold (John Gay 18th century poet), and Soldier's Buttons...

They are usually found in ditches, wet meadows and shady places...  I found that the photographs I took of the Kingcups in the shade of a hawthorne tree came out much better than those photographed in the bright sunshine...  I used my Nikon 55-200 mm lens...

The dark green leaves have heart shaped blades on long stalks...

It is a member of the buttercup family and the blossoms look very similar although these are much larger.

In folklore they were hung upside down in doorways in May to ward off witches and were also used as a protection against lightning...

The blossoms are 1"-2" across...

They flower from March to July but I always find they are at their most spectacular towards the end of April when they are in full bloom and haven't started to die back...

Closeup Lichen...

25 April 2011

Easter Monday...

Macro Monday...  and The Power of Observation: Life in a Tiny Ecosystem...

I couldn't resist a few more closeup photos of lichen...

I just find something magical about lichens...

I really must look for a book that shows what the different varieties are...

The thorns on the hawthorne tree... I took these photographs before the leaves came out...

These photographs were taken while walking across the fields on Cavehill...

These gave a frosty look to the photo even though it was warm sunny morning...

They are like a forest within a forest...

Among the mass of silvery toned lichen was a little microcosm of yellow...

Jelena and Diane...

Monday 18 April 2011

Macro Monday...  I thought that this week I would do a follow up on my Yellow Witch Hazel post...

Jelena

This orange blossomed Hamamelis was the first witch hazel that I bought 12 years ago.  

It is truly beautiful... but not perfumed...  

It has gorgeous orange blossoms in Winter...

and its foliage takes on an orange Autumn colour

The shrub has grown well in the acidic conditions of our garden

in a shady border beside the neighbours garage...

The blossoms glow in the early morning sunshine...

like tiny bright starbursts against the dark ivy and camelia backdrop...

Diane

Diane is the red witch hazel and has smaller spidery blossoms...

it is a beautiful and very dainty looking shrub...

but not as showy as the yellow or orange witch hazels... unfortunately, I planted this one quite close to the scented Pallida in my front garden so it gets a little overshone by the showier larger Pallida blossom.

Blackthorn Blossom...

11 April 2011

For Macro Monday this week I have a series of photographs that I took of the delicate white blossom  swathing the elegant thorny dark barked Blackthorn...

For Christmas Neil bought me a Sigma 70-300mm lens for my new DSLR camera...

I tried it out once and found that virtually none of the photos came out without being very blurry.  I have diabetes and have a bit of handshake and this was more noticeable using this lens.  I do have a tripod but for the type of snapping I like to do it isn't really for me...

So I decided it was time after all these months to give this lens a fair chance...  

So I took it out for a walk...

I have always loved this beautiful blossom.  I like that it comes out before the leaves and the thorny twigs are covered in a mass of stunning white blossom.  

In Autumn the sloes can be picked to make sloe gin a rather enjoyable beverage on a cold winter night.

Once (when I was a child) I picked some blackthorn to bring into the house and my mother shooed me and my blackthorn out of the door before we had even crossed the threshold...  Considered to be very unlucky to bring Blackthorn blossom into the house... odd really, as the wood is often used for walking sticks...  

Blackthorn has very long elegant and sharp thorns...  which if you get scratched by them the wound will often go septic...  it was used in past times tipped with poison as a way of getting rid of enemies...

I have a couple of books about trees and the mythology surrounding them.  One of my favourite is The Wisdom of Trees by Jane Gifford.  The other I refer to often is Irish Trees - Myths, Legends & Folklore by Niall Mac Coitir.  Both of these are packed with fascinating information about the Blackthorn.  The Blackthorn like the Hawthorn is considered to be a fairy tree...  It is a tree that has connotations with the practice of black magic.  

The blossom is small and delicate ...  with gorgeous long stamens...

The beautiful blossom has often been used to describe feminine beauty...

"My love is like the flower on the dark blackthorn"